Talk:Casual Games SIG/Whitepaper/Market Overview

International Game Developers Association

Market Overview/Section 7

Feeback on References to Skill Gaming in Market Overview Sectrion '

Things that might be interesting to address as part of the discussion on skill-gaming throughout the White Paper:

• Provide a Detailed Overview of the Skill Gaming Model
• Audience Demographics
• How ranking works.
• Use of Avatars in Skill-gaming
• Different requirements between skill & Casual games
• Cannibalization & Downloads
• Skill-gaming on various platforms
• Where is skill gaming going in next 2 years
• Difference between skill-gaming and gambling
• Potential and reality in International market

- "Summary" at the very beginning seems weird. Would expect it to be called "Introduction" or "Overview" - For the Skill Games Overview, would be nice to be able to see some visual depiction of audience demographics such as a pie chart, etc.

Skunkstudios 11:30, 21 Mar 2006 (PST)

Feedback on Entire Market Overview Section

Section 1: Introduction This section goes into great detail trying to differentiate between downloadable and web games -- and I think this one of those artifacts from when this paper was titled the "Online Games White Paper" and there was this weird tension between trying to define the two. In a lot of ways, the Market Overview is one of the most important sections. It needs to set the tone for the entire White Paper, the de facto source for all that's new and relevant in the casual games industry. I feel the introduction ought to be about introducing the concept of "casual games" -- what they are, what sets them apart from more core games, where people find them, etc. Maybe you can even provide a working definition of what makes a casual game, i.e., "games everyone can play" "accessible games", etc. Casual games are not simply defined by web vs. downloadable -- and never were.

Section 2: Target Audiences Would revise to focus on defining casual games audiences.

Section 3: Revenue Forecasts & Segmentation There's got to be some research out there or people we can reference who have more updated numbers Price-points not mentioned here. I would consider talking about "Business Models" (Section 5.5) here Does it make sense to link to or reference any of the data gathering initiatives regarding revenue reporting here? Does it make sense to discuss what's not known about revenue forecasts?

Section 4: Common Industry Trends and Market Forces What about consolidation? Diversification? International opportunities?

Section 5.3: Casual genres and characteristics Maybe this belongs in the introduction, where you define what casual games are.... I think this section focuses too much on listing games (which is done better in the design and production section) and not talking about the characteristics of casual games and the casual games industry in general The genres seem incomplete. If you decide to list out genres like this, you may want to coordinate with Juan Gril (Editor of Production Section) to see how he's listing out genres so that you guys are both in-sync.

Section 5.4: Core genre characteristics Doesn't seem deserving of its own section even though it may be touched on throughout this section in appropriate places.

Section 5.5: Business Model Consideration Why are these "considerations"?

Section 5.6: Key Players Developers need to be mentioned here. There should be examples of key players from every segment of the value chain.

Section 6: Web and Community-Based Games I think it would be fascinating to have a case study written by someone from Pogo on community in casual gaming.

Section 7: Skill-Based Games As you know, Steve Meretzky is focusing on skill games -- so you guys may wish to touch base on this section

Conclusion: There's really no conclusion to this section. It kind of just falls off. Maybe it's not necessary, but might be nice to re-cap what was discussed and further set the tone for what's to follow.

Skunkstudios 5:21, 20 Mar 2006 (PST)

I've pretty much pulled all of the Market Overview content over. We still need to get a couple of the tables over, and we probably should break this into multiple pages all within the Market Overview Hierarchy--Dubane 12:01, 29 Dec 2005 (EST)

[edit] Only Adgames and Skillgames ?

Where are the casual games themselves or viral (funny) webgames?

Thanks for catching this. When I updated to match the white paper it looks like we lost most of the section content. That should be fixed now

Brian Robbins 14:41, 18 Jul 2006 (EDT)